Non profit energy supplier

It does make me so het up that prepayment meters, particularly in rental properties, so often hit those who struggle with the higher cost of them hardest. I'm pleased to read they distribute the costs so this doesn't happen.

towerhill

"Non profit energy supplier" - an oxymoron surely?

vegplot

towerhill wrote:

"Non profit energy supplier" - an oxymoron surely?

If the directors pay themselves enough in salaries and aren't satisfying shareholders then any company can be not-for-profit.

Shane

vegplot wrote:

towerhill wrote:

"Non profit energy supplier" - an oxymoron surely?

If the directors pay themselves enough in salaries and aren't satisfying shareholders then any company can be not-for-profit.

Unfortunately, as soon as they get big enough to irritate the big boys, they tend to get taken over - money talks, even to the board of a not-for-profit company!

Still looks interesting, though.

gz

It had a good write up in the Guardian about 6 months or more ago

Rob R

I think we'll stick with what we've got.

Anders

We are in the process of switching to them at the moment.

Hairyloon

OK, so now we need a not for profit phone company.

gz

Anders wrote:

We are in the process of switching to them at the moment.

Let us know how you fare

Helen_A

Ebico really are the 'good guys' in the notforprofit sense The directors are all people who came forth from the whole Jubilee 2000/Make Poverty History movement, and by and large are all still involved in those sort of things.

The likelihood of them selling out is small - its just not in their ethics to do so.

We're with them for our gas supply (equigas). Took less than 2 months to get the switch done and they even poked the previous company into giving us a proper refund of what we had on account (unused) when they were trying to claim that the meters had been misread and we couldn't possibly have 'only' used £5 of gas over June/July/Aug.

cab

Interesting... And simple. I like it. I'll look into whether we should switch to them.

Rob R

Do they only do domestic?

Cathryn

Did anyone find out if they were business as well?

Nick

Backed by Cameron, and offering Carbon Offsets....

Cool.

alison

Rob R wrote:

Do they only do domestic?

Looks like it, that was what I wondered.

Rob R

I'm guessing that the idea is they don't want to be benefitting profit making companies...

James

we've been with Ebico for about a year now...no complaints at all.
I switched to them becuase I dont agree that its ethically correct to make such massive profits.

Ebico dont do much in terms of communicating with their customers...to the point were we didnt realise we were their customers.
We applied to change to them, and didnt hear anything to say we'd actaully changed supplier. They sub-contract their billing to Southern Electric, so the bills come from them. Southern Electric were our previous supplier, so we didnt realise we'd changed. a few months ago, we noticed in small letters on the bill it says "Ebico". Thats the only way I know we're with them.

Having said that, they are good, and I'd recommend them.

I've phoned them up two or three times, and each time I've got through to a local representative immediately, no recorded message followed by "press 1 for this, press 2 for that." before being put through to a call centre in another country.

gz

What are their rates? Would it be different down here?

Rob R

James wrote:

They sub-contract their billing to Southern Electric, so the bills come from them. Southern Electric were our previous supplier, so we didnt realise we'd changed. a few months ago, we noticed in small letters on the bill it says "Ebico". Thats the only way I know we're with them.

They're not noticeably cheaper than SE, then?

Helen_A

I've had this out with them as well - it wasn't long after than that they started to put ebico on the bills, lol....

For us, (gas only through them) the rates are a *lot* less than we were paying elsewhere. We were expecting them to be around 40% less, but they are actually working out as over 60% less per KwH

James

Rob R wrote:

James wrote:

They sub-contract their billing to Southern Electric, so the bills come from them. Southern Electric were our previous supplier, so we didnt realise we'd changed. a few months ago, we noticed in small letters on the bill it says "Ebico". Thats the only way I know we're with them.

They're not noticeably cheaper than SE, then?

hard to say, becuase we switched at the time that fuel prices were going up every week or two, so comparing like with like was tricky.

Using an on-line calculator, and 1 years worth of actual readings, we estimated it would save us around £40 pa for both gas and electricity. Most of that saving was on the gas.

Its not a HUGE saving...but its worth it, and you can guarantee that your not lining a capitalist fat-cat's pocket.

gz

can you say what the unit prices are?
Am I right in thinking there is only the unit charge and no charge per day of service?

Rob R

gz wrote:

can you say what the unit prices are?
Am I right in thinking there is only the unit charge and no charge per day of service?

EquiPower provides electricity at the same rate per unit to all our customers within a distribution region. Your regional rate isnít altered by how much you use or how you choose to pay, and there are no standing charges.

VM

For phones you want The Phone Coop.

AnneandMike

Are they cheaper - it depends upon how much you use! Because there is no standing charge and initial higher rate unit charges, you will save money if you are a lower consumer. My quarterly gas bill in August was £36.00 from EON, but Ebico would be £21.28, based on 579 KWh. However, the quarter bill to end of February was £212.99 from EON and would have been £215.24 from Ebico (5857 KWh).

Over the whole year I would have saved £31 with Ebico. Their electricity is cheaper but we are with Ecotricity and so will not change.

gz

What is the website address?- or do I just google ebico?

Rob R

It's in tahir's first post

gz

NQ!!!

towerhill

Thanks for the heads up on this Tahir... After looking into these and a couple of others I've now made the switch from SWALEC. It's one of those things which has been on a to do list somewhere for a while.